


Engaging the Enemy

by 3amepiphany



Category: Wander Over Yonder
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-11
Updated: 2016-07-11
Packaged: 2018-07-22 21:26:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7454482
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/3amepiphany/pseuds/3amepiphany
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Art of War is a pretty popular book, universally. Some just apply it better than others do.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Engaging the Enemy

It hadn’t been an instant turnabout.

It took a lot of communication. A lot of it rough and awkward and just as much defeatist as it was forgivingly understanding, but Peepers, as persistent as he usually was about things he wanted, and wanted to get rightfully, made his case and made it well. Oddly enough, this time he’d done it without saying a word and without even realizing he’d done so.

There was simply no tiring Sylvia out when it came to exploration and experiences and excitement, and that was how she had always seemed for as long as he’d known her; educating himself on Zbornaks, notable Zbornaks in Zbornak history, how Zbornak culture played an important part on the development of the galaxy it resided in originally before branching out in the universe to other star clusters and planetary formations, how Zbornaks felt and dealt with this, and so on, all of it time he’d used up and knowledge he’d gained in the past to see if he could get an upper hand against her. Spiritual warfare, in a sense that he didn’t like to laud. The whole concept was weirdly gentle and while it was appealing intellectually he never really saw himself in the position he was in now, because of it. Maybe that’s why he stayed far away from that philosophy when it came to tactics.

But somehow she’d still wound up brutally imperiling him nearly every time they’d gone toe-to-toe, and he didn’t realize until all was said and done that every single one of his failings against her were because of his own awe in her. 

They made a really, truly good team together, though, undeniably.

And that was where he began, really. With the two of them. It wasn’t eloquently done, he knew it. He was nervous. Was it too early to talk about? But then he’d steeled himself. He had come this far. And she was wise and clever and had been hard to win over, even just to have a first date, and a third, and then a regular sort of thing. And she hadn’t made him stop working for that, either.

So when he did decide to start the conversation, he wasn’t really surprised to hear her resoundingly confused, “What? No, no, hold on, there. No. Hold on.” But he’d put it on the table. They were a good team. They ought to try their hand at getting married. Why not?

“Gosh. This _is_ just conversation about it, right? You’re not actually… asking? I feel bad flatly saying that,” she’d said quietly, her neck laid over his stomach as they listened to jazz albums, stretched out on the floor of his-- _their_ quarters on the Skullship. “That wasn’t really something I’d considered. Like. At all. Ever…”

“I know. It really wasn’t, was it?” he conceded. It’d been all about the afterglow of surviving and relishing that, making amends and living anew and the restoration and rebuilding and helping with those efforts. It hadn’t been about more than that and the travel that went along with it. So he put it away, respectfully, assuring her that it was just conversation about it, he wasn’t really asking. And he wasn’t, truly; but that didn’t mean the gears in his head had been turning for a bit, trying to figure out how to go about that. She didn’t speak about it after that and didn’t let it affect what they had going, and he was relieved. The casualness of their relationship was something he’d worked harder than he ought to have when it first started and it was actually a lot more work for him to maintain than he imagined it would have - it was funny how that turned out, surely - and he’d have hated to see it all go ends-up over an awkward and mal-timed talk about moving away from that and into seriousness.

He loved her too much.

When Demurra and Draykor asked Wander to come and house-sit while they attended a political retreat, Wander declined, a bit dramatically, as he’d already made plans to take Hater to help restore the electrical atmosphere of another small planet in need, but then asked Sylvia if she and Peepers might like to have a weekend doing something new and away from the Skullship and the army. Peepers very obviously hesitated, and she knew why he would, but ultimately he decided he ought to trust his cabinet, and more importantly to trust Hater with the responsibility of better-establishing and then caring for a planet he’d come to own, soon enough (aside from the voracious Tim-Tim), so that he might benefit from it.

And it’d been a wonderful weekend. Their wards adored waking up to fancy breakfasts, learning about exactly what it was their parents were off trying to accomplish for their planet, making some of the most outstanding pillow forts ever, and playing while cleaning up. He put on his best show during royal tea-time, when he’d serve actual tea and peanut butter finger-sandwiches to the children, and slip into his bureaucratic shoes for a while to address make-believe issues in the make-believe kingdom that the children presided over. They took turns solving simple problems and making decisions about delegation and sharing. He played right into their upbringing and education, and excelled at it. Sylvia mostly enjoyed watching him take charge without being forceful. She hadn’t ever been sure that he could do that, she’d elbowed him and muttered after they’d tucked the children into bed on the last night.

Peepers blushed a bit.

He carefully got up in the middle of the night to go and walk through the hedge maze and just think, because he didn’t have any reports to look over or run or file, no surprise inspections to do. Just the children to mind and Sylvia to help. And that urge to approach the conversation again. When he came back after a good hour or two, she was very obviously feigning sleep. He decided against calling her on it in the hopes of starting up a talk.

She let him sleep in.

They’d come back from the trip to find that Hater, of course, had preemptively conquered the planet, sure, that was almost to be expected, but that was no huge deal to him. He gave commands with grace and everyone was afraid that he was bottling everything up only for it to explode later. But he was just thinking, making mental lists, trying to figure out an actual, legitimately good approach and when to make it happen. Reassessing things. He spent some time at the workload he needed to catch up on in quiet contemplation. He’d taken the time to learn how to work with Wander instead of against him, and he was becoming less of a parent to Hater and more of an advisor. He was being less of an insufferable bastard overall. It was weird and he wasn’t sure now if she’d been joking in the hallway outside the children’s room that night.

Sylvia and Wander slated some time to take off on one of their random, hyper-impromptu trips to go see an old friend that needed some help and company, soon enough. She and Peepers had a quiet night in before she was to leave, with a good meal and some music, and time alone. He slept fitfully, though, still full of words and thoughts, and he lay in bed staring at the ceiling after she’d gotten up, gotten showered, and kissed him goodbye. He waited for his own alarm to go off instead of going back to sleep. Finally he just couldn’t wait any longer, and got up and went about his day two hours earlier than usual. She was only going to be gone for a few days.

Later on, Hater finally spoke up about his mood and asked him what he was planning on doing, because it was kind of a drag to see him so “Bleh,” as he’d put it, about work and conquering and everything. “If you’re in a funk, we could always take the van out,” Hater said, kicking back in his chair in the boardroom, Captain Tim in his lap.

Down at the blackboard, copying notes and scribbles into the ship’s digital interface, Peepers stopped and sighed. “Sir, I don’t really think it’s a matter of being in a funk.”

“You’re in a funk. She’s got you in a funk.” Hater shrugged, “You can say that, I won’t judge. At least about that specifically. I mean, I also won’t lie, though, I’m sort of judging the whole vibe you’re giving off where it’s suddenly all, ‘killing people without purpose is a lot of trouble with no benefit’ and ‘appearing to follow local laws on unconquered planets is a safer move at the onset than flaunting them.’ It’s unsettling. But I think it’s because she’s got you in a funk.”

He stared at his boss with a rather comical expression. “Is my performance _failing_ , Sir?" 

“Noooo, no no. I’m not saying it’s her or your job, Grop, Peepers, we’ve already been through that. You and I both know now how important you are to my complete and utter rule of this place. What I’m saying is that you’re looking at extremes instead of trying to find a balance. You didn’t even flinch when I asked you what your plans were and that right there is a heck of a sign that you are dead set on coming to a clear decision and you can’t.”

He turned back to the board and scribbled down some more notes on his tablet with his stylus, and then reached for the chalk and made a correction to some math. “Sylvia’s not trying to make a decent guy out of me,” he said after a minute or so. “She’s waiting for me to do that myself, and rightly so. It’s not her job.”

“It’s not Wander’s job, but it _is_ his endgame. The sooner I realized that, the easier it was for me to just let the good deeds and such do the conquering work for me. People eat that up and Wander’s off my back. No resistance.”

Peepers paused again, wanting to say “But this is love, this is different than ruling, there is no room for brute force.” And he wondered if maybe that wasn’t her game, too. He sort of felt like he’d been punched in the gut. By her. All over again. Nah, he thought. That couldn’t be right.

After some more consideration, he figured it wouldn’t hurt to go cruise for a bit to clear his head some, anyways, so he said as much, and Hater excitedly called for the van to be readied for a small road trip. Captain Tim screeched a bit in return.

There was a small bit of overlap in the return, and he came back to his quarters to take a shower, only to find her passed out in their bed, snoring away. So he unpacked his gear, set his helmet on his desk to clean it and sharpen the finial later, and cleaned up as quietly as he could. Freshly shaven and smelling like a well-civilized and stylish commander ought to, he crawled onto the bed with her in his towel, ready for a lazy nap himself. “Your towel’s still wet,” he heard her say after a little bit, and she tugged at it with a laugh. They wrestled for a moment or two, giggling, and she finally let him and his decency be. “I missed you.”

“You didn’t text me at all,” he said quietly.

“Neither did you,” she countered. She wasn’t mad, this was easy to tell. “But I figured you needed a little room for your big head to process some stuff. You’d been quiet.”

“I’m still quiet. Hater didn’t like it. We took the van out for a spin.”

Sylvia nuzzled him, curling her tail up around him. “Step back into the past a bit to see how far you’ve come from it?”

“Something like that. At least, that’s what it was for me. I think he’s just trying to shake some sense into me. He’s worried that I’m having a crisis of sorts, and you’re the reason for it.” He rolled over and she gave him a very earnest look.

“That I’m beguiling you away from a life of evil before I agree to marrying you?” Peepers didn’t answer, and she sighed. Heavily. “I’d been worried about that.”

“You’ve been thinking about that.”

“I have. You’re literally the biggest prick I’ve met, and I’ve had a lot of friends who could fit that billing. There’s no law that says you have to be any less evil to have a healthy and rewarding relationship with a rival and granted, the tension was nice when we had it, but listen, I’ve done my fair share of dirty work and you guys have this weird new objective. I’m an opportunist. If loving you dialed you back a bit, I wasn’t going to say anything. Like… it’s been really neat watching you shift and adjust. Watching you mellow out and come down, stopping the yelling and the constant stressing of situations that don’t need it.”

“You sneak.” He said this half jokingly, but he had that feeling in the pit of his stomach again.

“You did it of your own accord, though, I held very few expectations and those were either already or very quickly surpassed whenever I’d expressed them. You can’t lie about that.”

He lay there, playing with her hand a bit and thinking back. There was the art piece he’d donated to a museum at her offhanded comment about war spoils, even though that was something he’d come by (at least to his knowledge) legitimately; there was the easing up of corporal punishment for the army, though that sort of came down to resources more than anything; there were a few more instances, but in the time they’d been dating, really, it was all him. And he had to concede the point. He’d called it. He knew it and he’d called it. She'd beaten him again. 

“But all the same I know you still have a job of sorts to do, and do well. I try not to hinder you. I hope I do well with that.” A sly smile crossed her snout.

“You’re such a card, you know that.”

“I know it.”

“...He thinks I can strike a balance.”

“So can I. It’s not this or your job, is it?”

“No. You know. Objectives change. There’s no enemy to engage, truly. We don’t really have any competition to keep anymore, not yet. I don’t have to prove myself so vehemently to anyone anymore, either. It’s just upkeep. Maintenance and upkeep. But it’s still a good objective and still something to work hard for and relentlessly over. That’s just how I do. So no. Hater made that clear.”

“Good. Because I do love you, but I don’t want you to have to give up so much of what makes you, you, to love me back. It’s not fair to you. As fun and as nice as it is for me, it’s not a prerequisite to marry you, either. And I’m making _that_ clear. Clear?” She hugged him close and gave a softer, more content sigh.

“...Can we talk about that?”

“Are we not?”

“I’m gonna back up a bit, though, hold on. You’ve been thinking about that.”

Sylvia went quiet for a short while before saying, “I’d been thinking about it since you first brought it up. That’s why I say I was worried about the whole wily ways bit. I worried that a lot of your personal changes were because of that, because I tabled the discussion. You’d definitely bent to me when I demanded respect but I think that came from somewhere else, way before any of this.”

He laughed. “Yeah, it did.”

“I can’t say it was a mutual respect so much as it was a mutual recognition.”

He blinked, his expression falling just a bit. “Oh?”

“But I’m an opportunist, and I saw the potential and rolled with it. You did your thing. And then I got caught off-guard a bit and I feel like I messed everything up and forced your hand. But as things went on and I realized that you weren’t going to bring it up again and again and again, you just... you let it be and you were still doing your own thing. So. Full-circle on that comment.”

“If loving you dialed me back a bit, you don’t really have to say anything,” he said quietly.

“Except that I might.”

They lay there in silence for a good amount of time, her simply laying there with her eyes closed, a smile on her face and her tail tip twitching a little here and there. Thinking about how his and Hater’s trip was literally just a trip, no expectations for goofing off or ruining others’ days or any of it. Just good music and few words and some time to clear his head. Objectives were changing, that was for sure. He’d changed along with them and she and her love and respect were the greatest benefits out of it. Peepers played with her hand that she had draped across his chest, and he wondered which one of her fingers she’d wear a ring on, if zbornaks even went for that sort of thing, if _she_ was even going to go for this sort of thing. “I’m still probably the biggest prick you know,” he finally said. “I’m trite and full of particulars, and I know you’ve had a difficult time finding some smidge of respect for me over the years. You’re level-headed and full of endurance and wit almost to spite me instead of complimenting me and my style. But compliment you do. Necessity, might-as-wells, wily beguiling... however we’re moving forward with this,” he paused when she started to giggle, and he started laughing, too. “Okay, but, okay. Okay. However this is happening and why, you and me, us, we’re a pretty great team together, regardless of how good you are and how dastardly I can be. Right?”

“You’re pretty dastardly.”

He played with her fingers some more, very obviously, wrapping his finger around hers to see exactly which one would look better with a ring on it. She let him, very patiently. “Right. Well. Sylvia, would you consider putting that aside in the name of a healthy and rewarding relationship with your rival? If I asked you to marry me?”

“Might as well,” she said with a loud laugh, snuggling him tightly as he started laughing, too. “Dag it, your towel’s still wet.”

“Oh, flarp the towel,” he said, taking a moment to fight with it before tossing it into the doorway of the bathroom.

“It was watching you with the Draykor kids, you know,” she said with a small laugh, later. He opened his eye and made a noise at her, and she craned her neck down and gave him a kiss. “Yeah. Total last straw. Absolutely the worst evil thing you’ve done was be gentle and kind.”

He stretched, yawning and petting at her neck a bit. “Imagine. Starting a family. Raising actual kids.”

“Instead of Wander and Hater and your whole Grop-darned army, I suppose?”

“If you like, sure. But we can still do that.”

“I just thought you should know this now, so you can start in on the next objective... that one’s going to take me a bit longer to come around to.” He groaned at that, and she laughed some more.


End file.
